


Hell

by bedb



Category: Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel (Comics)
Genre: Brutality, Character Death, F/M, Slavery, Violence, assassinations
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-14
Updated: 2015-11-05
Packaged: 2018-02-13 02:11:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 9,449
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2133159
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bedb/pseuds/bedb
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>several ficlets on the hell that was the Winter Soldier's life. One of the stories is what would have been the outcome if Clint had known about the Soldier's attack at the bridge. Pierce is a monster. Natasha tries to save James.</p><p>I in no way profit from anything created by Marvel. I simply live vicariously through Natasha</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A Man for sale

**Author's Note:**

> several short stories about the darkness of the Winter Soldiers life. Although it's possible the soldier did fall victim of sexual abuse, that topic will not be covered. If there is any mention of sex it will be in relationship to Natasha and positive but only in hind sight. No slash.

A man was for sale, and the starting price was five million US dollars. 

Natasha sat with her ‘companion’ a Russian mobster named Yuri who’d made his fortune in drugs, prostitution and human trafficking. Her bright red hair was dyed a pale ash blonde. Reflective shades hid their eyes. Yuri did it to look cool, Natasha because she wasn’t certain how she was going to act when they finally presented the main reason for this impromptu auction in the middle of Siberia.

The first to go were a couple of tanks and some scud missiles. Yuri liked the tanks but had no place to park one, but at 500, 000 US, they were a steal. Maybe he could pick one up later from one of the buyers. But right now he was saving his cash for the ‘Winter Soldier’. Rumor had it an American with very deep pockets was bidding against him through an agent over the Internet. Natasha was praying that was just a rumor and that Mad Man Yuri was the top bidder. If Yuri bought James, she’d be able to free him. 

The talk up began with a flurry of loud noise coming from an area behind the speaker’s dais. Staring down into a small arena where cattle were run through for auction, the gate opened and two men controlling a third with long poles attached to his neck brought him in. It was all for show. Natasha tried to calm her racing heart and wear a mask of indifference, not unlike the hunter’s mask they had attached to his face. No one could see the rage or pain that he was in unless they looked closely at his brilliant eyes. Two sets of manacles one at the elbows and the other at his wrists kept his arms securely behind his back. And for any pervert who might like the view, the manacles at his elbows forced his shoulders back so that his chest was more pronounced. Nude but for the simple wool mask and manacles, he roared in anger. A metal bit made speech impossible by cutting his tongue and lips if he tried to speak, but it couldn’t keep him from yelling his rage. Natasha tried not to show anything at the sight of blood on his chin. He had fought the bit as she knew he would.

For him to be this agitated, they must have brought him out of cryostatis at least a week earlier. There was also the possibility that they had him pumped full of synthetic adrenalin. The two men fighting to control him were told to let him go, and Natasha smiled grimly as the two men hesitantly, timidly, shivering like terrified rabbits eased their way down their poles to the connections on the leather collar around James’ throat. James had stopped fighting and was watching the man on his left approach him. No man or woman who had ever looked into eyes that angry ever lived to tell about it.

Even without the use of his flesh and blood hand or the ‘arm’ he moved so fast neither man had a chance to get away. Using the strength of his legs he kicked and broke the necks of both men. They collapsed in the sand to the roars of the assembled people. A dozen rifles clearly visible forced him away from the wall.

“He would certainly keep your enemies at bay,” Natasha whispered into Yuri’s ear.

Yuri smiled as the crazed man in the auction pen stared up at the people looking down on him. One would have to be blind to not notice how physically perfect he was. “Maybe you fancy that for yourself,” he replied in a threatening whisper.

Natasha was no fool. “I would fuck him in a second if I didn’t value my life,” she answered indifferently. If she had said anything else, Yuri would have had her shot the moment they left the auction.

The bidding began at five million US dollars. Right from the start the unknown American matched and raised every bid. His agent had the auction stopped so that he might better see the soldier’s arm on the monitor. This meant someone had to get in the pen with him and get a camera close to the arm…or get a zoom lens and do a close up. Natasha knew these people were too stupid to do the latter so someone was going to enter the pen with James and take a picture of his arm. Someone decided that a young girl had a better chance of doing this than a grown man. At least he might spare her life.

The lucky girl holding the camera looked fifteen if even that old. She was clearly terrified when James spun around and glared at her. Even after softening his eyes, the girl stared at him as if he were a tiger about to eat her. With the men behind the pen yelling encouragements at her, she slowly approached James with the small hand held camera and held it up to his metal arm. After a few painfully terrifying moments the girl dropped the camera and ran for the gate, where she was let out without hesitation.

James looked down at the camera and after a minute or two, he raised his bare foot and crushed it down on the camera. The American’s bid went even higher. Natasha glanced impatiently at Yuri who seemed to be biding his time. He finally matched and raised the last bid.

Natasha leaned back in her seat and crossed her leg. Regrettably that movement drew James’ eyes to her. He recognized her! Keeping her face as neutral as possible, in spite of the gut wrenching pain eating her alive, she kept her eyes on him. Her agony grew ten fold when a tear slid down his grizzled cheek.

“Why is he looking at you like that?” Yuri asked suspiciously. 

“Buy him and ask,” Natasha countered. Then realizing Yuri was frowning harder, she said, “There are not many women here. Perhaps he can’t believe we find pleasure in his suffering.”

“Perhaps,” Yuri said and raised his bid. Pierce matched and raised his own.

A man with a pole entered the arena and drew James’ eyes away from Natasha. The man attempted to get James to move, but the end result was not what he had planned. James could kick like a mule and had taught Natasha how to do the same. The man’s body slammed against boards designed to hold cattle and reindeer in. He collapsed on the ground and died beneath James’ heel to his throat.  
The American was satisfied. Ten million US dollars was offered for the man in the arena. The Winter Soldier now belonged to a powerful American.

Weapons and ropes subdued the Winter Soldier. Once the money was transferred, the soldier was going to be readied for his new master. James screamed defiantly, and although Natasha was no longer in her chair, she could see that he was looking for her.

“I want to go down and have a better look at him,” she told Yuri, who snorted in agitation.

“Don’t be long,” he growled.

“I won’t,” she lied. It was time to say good-bye to Yuri.

Natasha found the truck where they were going to move him. He was chained to the reinforced bumper while preparations were being made. She didn’t dare get too close to him with all the weapons pointed at him. What good would it be if she got him killed?  
He turned so he could look at her. It broke her heart seeing him like this, but there was nothing she could do right now.

“Always the pretty girls want a look at the Soldier,” someone remarked sarcastically. “One look at his body and they want to crawl up his pole,” the uniformed officer continued.

Natasha looked at the man and then back at James without making comment. She took off her glasses and prayed he could see the pain in her eyes. Her pain was nothing to his, but she needed him to know that whatever happened, she was not going to give up looking for him, and maybe one day she would be successful.

The terrible wounded look in his eyes softened for a moment. He still loved her.

Natasha stole a car and escaped before Yuri even noticed her missing. There were things she needed to do before finding a way to get to America. She had to find out who ha purchased James? And free him if she could


	2. Pierce

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pierce gets to meet his purchase for the first time.

Pierce looked at his prize purchase in the cryotube and smiled. He had the activation codes and a pair of Soviet scientists willing to defect to help his people learn the process for themselves.

The code was punched into the cylinder and the process began. Pierce had to be present to imprint on the soldier or he wouldn’t be able to control him later on. There could be no rush or skipped step. To do so would not only needlessly endanger the soldier, but it would also endanger the men in the room with him. Pierce stood back and watched in silence. Sgt. James Buchanan Barnes looked no older than he did when the Russians first found him, although his hair was a little longer and there was scruff on his face.

One armed guard stood in the room with him, a kid named Rumlow who showed promise. “He’s beautiful, isn’t he?” Pierce asked him rhetorically which was good because Rumlow didn’t know how to respond. “What did the Russians call him?”

Rumlow started to shrug when one of the Russians answered, “Soldat mostly. One general who knew his history would call him My Pretty just to annoy him.”

“He’s that responsive?”

“Da. You can make him forget but you can’t eradicate everything. He will tolerate no abuse, although the one he imprints on can get away with more than others.”

The Russian and American technicians opened the tube and moved the still very cold body to the chair and secured his nude body to it by his arms and legs. For the first time Pierce could touch his purchase. The flesh was still very cold and his hair was damp and dripping water.

“What about his body functions?” Pierce asked curiously.

“Everything is taken care of before he wakes,” the Russian explained. “It’s a part of the thawing process. And since he eats no solids, there isn’t much mess.”

“Does he ever need to fuck?”

“The longer he is out of cryostatis, the more like a man he acts,” the Russian said with a smirk. “The general who took him to the Middle East kept him out of cryo for years without incident, but he also kept him on a tight leash with monthly wipes. Still I heard that the Soldat liked the ladies and was sometimes permitted one. But that is rumor. What is known is that the general had him sterilized to thwart his colleagues in Moscow.”

“Sterilized?”

“Da, snip snip. They were afraid to castrate him for fear it would destroy his fighting temperament.”

Rumlow visibly grimaced.

Pierce was somewhat disappointed that his prize had been sterilized, but there were places where it could be undone should Pierce ever decide to experiment with eugenics.   
An IV was started and Pierce was amazed when his prize took his first deep breath. Watching that frozen body turn into a living warm blooded creature was amazing. When he started shivering, one of the Russians placed an electric blanket across his lap.

Slowly those incredibly keen eyes started to flutter. “Tell him to report,” the Russian told Pierce. “We’ll see if he’s retained anything from the sale.”

Pierce leaned over, made eye contact with his prize and said, “Soldier, report.”

Sgt. Barnes shifted his weight from one hip to the other, a look of pure confusion on his face. He did not know Pierce but he understood REPORT. Trying to find something in his tortured brain to report was torture in and of itself. He couldn’t find anything but Pierce waved it aside with a smile of reassurance.

“We need to get him up and moving,” the Russian said and freed the soldier’s arms and legs. Pierce helped him up and offered him support even as the soldier stared at his face. Pierce gave him a smile of reassurance. Although taller than the soldier, Pierce was not as heavy and it wasn’t all the arm. The soldier was deep through the breast like a fine racehorse with thighs to support his muscular body easily. There was no fat at all on his flat belly. Truly a beautiful speciman.

“You and I are going to make a great team,” Pierce told the soldier as they walked. “The world needs order and between us, we are going to make this a better place.” And Pierce spoke calmly and soothingly to the soldier as he regained his strength. “You are a gift to mankind, and we are so lucky to have you. But we can’t let the enemy destroy our good plans. You will be the avenging angel to bring these problems down. I have that much faith in you.” The soldier listened to every word with his eyes fixed on Pierce’s face. No one would ever speak to him the way Pierce did.

Once the soldier could stand on his own on those rock solid legs, Pierce let him ago. “Just magnificent,” he said and folded his arms across his chest. “You are truly the ultimate weapon against out enemies.” Turning to the waiting scientists, he said, “I will leave the Asset with you and return later. I want to take him out for a little test drive.” 

 

Pierce stood behind his prize with Rumlow behind him. It’s never really dark in DC but there were shadows where one could stand and watch. The Asset, cold and methodical stalked the junior director of SHIELD and took him out with a single shot to the back of the head. He never knew what killed him. Pierce tried to set it up to look like a robbery gone bad, but he really didn’t care. There were enough miscreants in DC to blame, and in the morning he’d begin pointing fingers.

Returning to the extraction van, Pierce grinned and asked, “Isn’t he magnificent?” 

And for once the young Hydra sniper replied, “He sure is.”

The Asset climbed into the back of the van and took his seat. Pierce was going to leave him out of cryo for awhile to see how he reacted over time. But right now he was more than pleased with his purchase.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Although not written as a story format, this just seemed like the next logical place to go. Although there is a lot of debate in fanfiction on how infantile Bucky was, I am of the opinion he was not as submissive as a lot make him out to be. Like any animal he would tolerate some abuse from his owner but he would eventually defend himself...and he would always defend himself against others.


	3. Dreams

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Natasha has a dream of James, but is it a dream?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Stress can cause the mind to do many things.

His kiss was soft and tender as he pressed her into the mattress with his hips while supporting himself on powerful arms, one flesh one metal. She ran her hands down the strong curve of his back to his lean hips. He was always so beautful and perfect, even when he appeared to her as this poor disheveled creature. Natasha moaned wantonly when he entered her, his cock moving slowly and deliberately against her heat. Even as hard as he was, he felt cold. When she threw her arms around his neck to hold him tighter, his skin was like ice. Everything about him was cold and desperate.

“Where are you?” she breathed against his lips as he slowly fucked her.

“I don’t know,” he whispered back, so much torment in his eyes. "i don't know where I am."

“You have to tell me something,” she pleaded as he drove harder into her. “Please!” she begged as he sped up and everything came apart. It was always over too quick for her tastes but she was never left wanting. This was a dream, she knew it was, but it didn't change her desperate need to know where to find him.

When he stopped moving, his forehead resting gently against hers, he whispered, “Help me.”

“James! You have to tell me where you are!”

 

Pierce took the soldier by the chin and made him look at him. Haunted eyes stared back at Pierce the shimmer of light within them unshed tears. This little incident was a reminder that the soldier had once been a real man.

“He’s remembering more things,” one of the witch doctors opined.

Witch doctor number two stepped up and added, “Stress can sometimes cause this.” Too much stress and tension in a body at the edge of sleep could sometimes produce an erotic dream.

Pierce smiled, a cold predatory smile. He knew everything about the soldier’s past and the pretty girl he had trained years ago, his only lover in seventy years. The wet dreams always came just before he broke down only he never slept. Just the power of memory. Pierce thought it funnier than hell that the woman the soldier dreamed about was not that far away from him. Why if he recalled correctly, she was in town now.

“Wipe and reset,” he said and righted himself, aware of the soldier’s tortured eyes following him. Couldn’t afford to lose the asset because he never forgot the woman from the Red Room for long.

The screams never bothered him. The Asset had stopped being a man years ago.

 

Natasha sat up suddenly, her heart pounding, her thoughts tormented by That Dream again. Clint turned over and looked at her. “You all right?” he asked with worry in his eyes.

“Yes,” she lied and got out of bed. Running to the bathroom, she closed the door and turned the shower on. The dreams didn’t come often, but when they did, they were devastating. Always pleading for her help, never knowing how to find him. 

After the shower she returned to the bedroom and found Clint sitting up with a little box in his hand. “I guess you think I forgot,” he said bashfully, “but it’s our anniversary.” He held out the little box. She took it and looked inside. “Cupid’s arrow,” he said with a laugh. “When you get hit by one, you never forget that love.” He stood up and helped Natasha put it on.

She turned towards the mirror and looked at it around her throat. “It’s beautiful,” she said, the dream momentarily forgotten.

“I’m not saying I’m your true love,” he mused, “but I’d like to think I’m in there somewhere.”

Natasha’s eyes clouded for a moment. True love? Love is for children. James, please tell me where you are.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> do you believe astral projection exists? I do.


	4. Zola

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zola decides to reinforce Sgt Barnes skeletal frame.

Dr. Zola peered over the surgeon’s shoulder at the work he was doing on Sgt. Barnes who was under heavy sedation for what was going to be some brutal surgery. Every bone on his left side was going to be reinforced with adamantium and vibranium or replaced outright. Barnes was stretched out, arms secured over his head to make it easier for Dr. Gorski to essentially filet his left breast. When it healed the scar would be unnoticable to all but the most trained eye. To replace the scapula and clavical would require an additional cut from his neck to his shoulder joint. Two ivs, a cathedar, a sedation mask and gastro drain kept him under and clean. The first surgery was going to take ten hours of carefully seperating meat from bone, of fusing metal to bone. For the time being they weren’t going to remove the entire rib cage, in hopes that reinforcing the part that would be most affected by the arm would suffice. There was also the sternum, although there would only be a small adjustment to it. Replacing it entirely would affect his breathing.

Gorski, the best in his field, sliced through the skin beneath the left breast and exposed the muscle. He had to keep it together with as much white tissue as he could save. Carefully exposing a rib, he used strong sheers to cut the bone away. The end of the bone was then shaped so the metal attachment would fit smoothly over it. A special glue made sure the metal attachment did not come off.

After the ten hour procedure Sgt Barnes was returned to a makeshift recovery room. As a precaution he was strapped down. The rest of his ribs and sternum would be completed tomorrow. Zola would have loved getting the entire surgery completed before leaving Barnes to heal before returning him to ice, but the surgical team that was performing the replacement and fusion needed to rest.

Permitted some conciousness to prevent pneumonia, James did not know what they were doing to him only that it hurt like hell. Forced to take deep breaths that brought tears to his eyes, he prayed it ended soon. Before it was over he was praying for death, which almost happened when the metal reinforcement on his sternum nicked the pericardial sac. A quick acting nurse drew the blood out before his heart quit beating.

James did not know how long he stayed in a semi-drugged state under Zola’s watchful eye, but he remembered how bad he hurt even with the drugs keeping him controllable. And there was no compassion. They were interested in what they were doing to him, but not in how it was affecting him.

What had he done to deserve this? Where were his parents? Where was Steve?

Uncontrollable tears streamed down the side of his face. 

Zola did not put Sgt. Barnes back into cryofreeze for quite some time. He wanted the muscle to attach to the enforced metal, which it would not do if they froze him. And so Barnes lived in agony while his body healed and bonded with the metal that now made up a lot of his skeletal frame. To prevent unnatural scar tissue from forming, electrical pulses were shot through his body. This was the first time he had a mouth guard placed in his mouth. It also gave Zola the idea to try electroshock therapy on his prize. 

If Sgt Barnes thought he was in hell now, he had no idea what was coming. After a couple of months of healing, and an X ray, he was placed back in cryofreeze.


	5. The Chitauri

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the boys in the lab let the Soldier see Natasha on TV along with her new love

The Chitauri were attacking New York and tearing the hell out of it. At the forefront of the city’s defense were the Avengers led by Tony Stark and Captain America, but Pierce wasn’t so sure they would be able to handle it all by themselves, so he had the Soldier unfrozen and put on a quick thaw the moment things started up. He wasn’t going to unleash his Asset just yet, not until he was absolutely certain Rogers and Stark were whipped.

Extremely passive the Soldier sat in the damned chair with his head slightly lowered a veil of dark hair falling over his face, but it was deceptive. He was alert and listening to the news reports. All around him armed guards kept their eyes and weapons on him while the doctors in charge of his care watched the news reports out of New York in an adjoining room.. The only thing missing was popcorn and soda pop.

“Oooh wheew!” the dark haired David laughed as the report showed the infamous Black Widow Natasha Romanoff doing an incredible leap upwards from the shield of Capt. America. The footage of the leap was simply amazing. “Now that’s a woman I would love to meet.”

“She would kill you,” the bespectacled Ed countered and folded his arms across his chest. Leaning closer and keeping his voice low, he said, “I’ve overheard talk that he used to know her, if you know what I mean.”

David looked surprised. “No, really?” he asked and glanced back at the stoic soldier and smiled. “Hey, Soldier, come here.”

The senior guard on duty Whitfield said, “That may not be a good idea, sir.” He hated Pierce and Rumlow leaving those two idiots in charge of the Soldier. 

“Nah, nah, it’s OK. We’ve doped him.” Waving at the Soldier, David said, “Come on, Soldier. Is this your girlfriend?”

“Don’t say that,” Ed warned him. “That could trigger negative memories.”

“I insist. It’s OK.”

The Soldier got up, a blank expression on his face, and joined them at the wide screen TV just off from the main bay. He stopped and stared at the screen until he spotted the red haired woman in the repeat news report. Awe filled his eyes and he reached out to touch the screen. “Natalia,” he whispered to himself.

“This isn’t good,” Ed warned David.

“Can’t remove everything,” David responded confidently and snapped his fingers to get the Soldier’s attention. “Who’s Natasha, Soldier?”

Soldier looked at the man but didn’t say anything. How could he tell them that this woman was his life, his heart and soul that she was going to find a way to save him from them? So he chose not to say anything at all.

He turned back to the TV and dropped to his knees in front of it his flesh and blood hand light on the screen as he waited for her face to reappear. When it did come back, he leaned his forehead against the screen and whispered, “Natalia.” A voice he had not heard in ages returned a whisper in his head. James. James, I love you; I will find you one day. Natalia, I don’t know where I am. I will still find you.

Since he was being quiet, no one thought to make him move back, but every time her face appeared he stared at it with the deepest of emotions burning in his eyes. Ed was the only one in position to see the hungry look, the adoration and blind love. This woman meant something to him, and Ed thought it was wrong to let him watch her with no hope of them ever meeting.

Everything came to a head when Iron Man closed the portal and fell back to Earth. The Avengers had succeeded with minimal help from the authorities or other agencies. The Soldier smiled. Then the worst thing imaginable happened, Natasha Romanoff threw her arms around Clint Barton’s neck and kissed him. Soldier’s eyes widened in surprise and then anguish. Natalia had forgotten him! There would be no freedom for him, no love waiting for him.

Crawling backwards from the TV, the light of unshed tears glowing in his eyes, he dropped his head and screamed. A wounded animal could not have sounded more agonized. The Soldier cried in grief and threw himself over backwards away from the set. Natalia had forgotten him! Forgotten her promise! Within seconds he was back on his feet a blind rage scalding him as he ripped the TV off the wall and slamming it on the floor. Then he realized he wouldn’t be able to see Natalia and got angrier. Even though she had forgotten him, he wanted to see her. Screaming even louder in his rage and pain, he kicked the broken set and fixed deadly eyes on the two men with him. They scampered away like terrified rabbits. 

The guards turned their rifles on him, but he didn’t care. He wanted them to shoot him. Wanted them to end this misery. An emergency alarm sounded and within minutes Rumlow and Rollins were in the basement. “Don’t you fucking dare shoot him!” Rumlow snarled and pulled out an electrified cattle prod. “If you do you’d better eat a bullet yourself,” he warned the armed men.

Rollins, a tazer in his right hand, grabbed Whitfield with his left and watched Rumlow back the Soldier up. “What the fuck set him off?”

“He saw his girlfriend on TV,” Whitfield stammered, a little too much white in his eyes.

“He’s an Asset,” Brock snarled louder. “He doesn’t have a fucking girlfriend.” The Soldier was looking for an opening to kick the shit out of Rumlow without getting himself stunned senseless, but the truth of Rumlow’s statement choked him. He didn’t have a girlfriend; he wasn’t even human. Turning his back to the Strike team leader, he no longer care what they did to him.

Brock and Rumlow jumped and dragged him to the ground. He didn’t even put up a fight as they quickly secured him with the strongest wrist cuffs made. When Pierce showed up and was given a detailed report, the head of HYDRA was silently livid. “Is that right?” he asked Whitfield.

“Yes, sir.”

Pierce grabbed his prize’s chin and raised his head. The pain in the Asset’s eyes was palatable. That couldn’t be tolerated. “Wipe him,” he told Ed and David. “Remove every scrap of information about her from him. I want his head a blank slate.” 

The Soldier blinked his last tears for Natalia. 

“I want him able to kill her if I tell him to.”


	6. Clint

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clint and Natasha are breaking up. He blames the Winter Soldier, she blames his girlfriend on the side.

Clint was furious. “So that’s the bastard you think about all the time? The reason why you didn’t call me in to help you?” Drawing closer to the silent woman sitting on the made bed, growling in her face, “Because you know I would have killed him.”   
Natasha lifted her eyes and he knew right then that he was right. “Dammit, Tasha, he shot you! Twice. How can you still want him after that.” He wanted to hurt her, make her feel the pain he was feeling, but Natasha’s face was blank, emotionless. “He’s no better than an animal, a rabid dog to be put down.” Still no expression. “I love you,” he pleaded with her.

She sighed heavily and gazed at her hands resting on her thighs. “You stopped loving me at least a year ago. You just don’t know how to let go.”

“No, this is not about me. It’s about him sitting in that room chained liked the animal he is.”

“That animal as you call him,” she said and stood up, “was once more human than you.” Leaving Clint to his own sufferings, Natasha walked out of the room with no intention of ever going back, and Clint knew it.

Sitting on the bed, holding his head in his hands, he tried to think, but the only thing he felt was his breaking heart. How could she say he didn’t love her? His heart was dying; his mind was breaking in two. All because that son of a bitch didn’t die or at least let his masters catch him. Rising to his feet, he knew what he needed to do. If Natasha was lost to him because of this bastard, what did it matter?

He knew there were cameras on the Winter Soldier, chained to the bolted table with his metal arm immobilized, but a quick check showed the monitoring room essentially empty. One of Tony’s geeks was on another computer playing World of Warcraft with someone in Canada, which would leave Hawkeye a few uninterrupted minutes with their guest.

Accessing the room, easy for an Avenger, he entered the room and stared at the dark haired man sitting so quietly in his chair. “You know who I am?” Clint asked and moved closer all nice and quiet. 

“Hawkeye,” the Soldier answered quietly, only his eyes betraying any suspicions.

“That’s right. Until this morning, until just minutes ago actually, Natasha was my girl. But apparently she has other concerns now.” The Soldier realized his danger and stood up, kicking the chair back to avoid tripping over it. Clint sat on the edge of the desk and gazed up at the Soldier with smile on his face. “Normally I wouldn’t even kick a dog, but you owe this to her.” And with everything he had behind it, he punched the Soldier in the face. “You shot her!” he growled and pounded down on the staggered man. “Not once but twice,” he continued, accentuating every word with a blow. He wanted to add “and she still loves you!’ but he didn’t. He just wanted to hurt this bastard, over and over until blood dripped on the floor.

Grabbing a fistful of that long dark hair, he jerked the Soldier’s head up and spat, “I’d chew your heart out if I could.” And he punched him again.

He could hear the door open behind him and Cap shout, “Clint! Clint! Let him go!” Cap grabbed him and jerked him away from the battered Soldier, but Clint’s revenge backfired. Natasha hurried into the room and froze the moment she and the Soldier locked eyes. Her face softened, her eyes misted, and she looked as if she wanted to run to him, embrace him, kiss him. Adoration filled his eyes, and it killed Clint to see them gazing at each other like that.

“No!” he shouted and broke free of Cap to grab Natasha. “No! You can’t. Not after what he did to you.” Soldier growled dangerously and rose to his knees, the strength of his effort to get to his feet rattling the bolted table.

“Bucky, no!” Cap tried to calm his friend down, but he was having no effect. “Let her go,” he told Clint.

Natasha, her eyes on the man holding her by the shoulders, turned her head towards the Soldier and said, “It’s all right, James.”

Clint’s heart jerked in his chest. His name was James not Soldier, and James was quieting down under Natasha’s tender gaze. “Why can’t you look at me like that?” he asked plaintively.

Natasha looked back up at Clint. She was angry with him, no not angry, furious. Livid! “Outside,” she said quietly so as not to upset James who was staring at them with his entire soul in his eyes. Clint knew he was in for it, and if this really was the end, he wanted it to be as brutal as possible. He wanted love to turn to hate and indifference. He wanted….Natasha hit him as hard as she could across the face. “You are a fool!” she snapped. “He did not deserve that! If you are so angry, you should have taken it out on me, or at least tried to.” Her smile turned down right evil. “I’m not going to let James return the favor, and I’m sure Cap will help me control him, but you need to go visit your girlfriend and get your head together.”

“She’s not my girlfriend,” Clint retorted angrily. “I told you that. And this is not about me.”

“Yes it is. And it’s about you agreeing with Tony that we all need to be registered. And the only reason why you support that is because you think it’ll take James out of my life.” 

“That’s not true.”

“Yes it is. You know he won’t register.” Natasha looked away as the full weight of what Clint was willing to do to keep her away from James hit her. “You have no idea how he has suffered, all the years he’s suffered…petty jealousy that you know really means nothing to you.”

“That’s not true,” Clint protested.

“Really?” she cut him with her eyes, and Clint withered under her gaze. “Go find Bobbi and tell her how awful I am, but if you ever lay hands on him again like this, I will see to it that you never use your hands again.”

“Threatening me?”

“Promising.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I truly believe...and it's logical,,,,that Clint and Natasha will wind up on different sides of the registration issue, and that that will break them up. We will be sympathetic towards both sides, but in the end Natasha will side with Cap and her old lover James. It's the only thing that makes sense right now.


	7. Petrokov

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Natalia is pregnant by her soldier. Dr. Petrokov's point of view. The hell is the simple inhumanity of it.

“The girl is pregnant,” the aide told Dr. Petrokov, who was sitting at her desk going over some notes.

“It was bound to happen,” she replied with a heavy sigh and took a drag on the cigarette sitting in the overflowing ashtray. “Ivan wanted to start a family…”

“Three months,” the aide interrupted her.

Petrokov slowly raised her head and stared at the thin nervous man. “That would mean….”

“She was pregnant when she married him.”

Petrokov stood up, an imposing woman in white. “Does Ivan know?”

“I think he knows she’s pregnant but not how far along.”

“Where is she now?”

“I sent her home.”

Petrokov thought about it a moment. “Call her, tell her to return in the morning. I need to check her myself.”

“On it now, comrade doctor.”

Petrokov reached behind her and grabbed her coat and hat. It was late fall and starting to get cold outside. Walking out to the parking lot within the heavily fenced and gated compound, she drove the two miles to the cement bunkers that housed the KGB’s most secret experiments. No one stopped her or asked for her identification as she entered the “reception” area and lit another cigarette. Chain smoking was going to kill her, but then who really cared? 

“Comrade doctor,” the technician on duty in the dimly room greeted her. He wasn’t used to having company unless they were going to wake the soldier up. 

She grunted at the technician and went straight to the filing cabinet. In the top drawer behind everything else was a file on the young man in cryostatis. He had an uncommon blood type as she remembered it. Opening the file, she thumbed through it, past the experimental surgeries and implants to a page that identified him as an American soldier found at the foot of a mountain with a shattered arm but alive. Blood type: B negative. He had brown hair and blue eyes. On the piece of arm that still remained was the small circular scar from a small pox vaccination.

Zola had pumped him full of drugs in an attempt to recreate Captain America, lost under an ocean somewhere off Greenland almost fifteen years earlier. Petrokov peered at the young man’s face behind the thick glass. He was handsome the way young women liked them. He would be awake now if he had behaved himself. She was always there when they put him under or woke him up. That last time they had caught him with the girl. If they hadn’t threatened the girl, he would have killed them all. Natalia had been too scared to fight back. Together they could have destroyed all the guards and made a run for it, but she was too well trained, and he wouldn’t risk her life.

Now he was neither alive nor dead. She made a copy of his vital stats on the mimeograph machine and put it in her purse. The only thing she carried in her purse were her cigarettes and car keys, but it was not considered correct for a woman to not carry a purse. Now she actually carried something worthwhile. 

Natalia arrived at the hospital on the compound the next day at seven. Trying to keep her fear under wraps, she let them lead her to an examination room where they asked her to change into the gown. She did as she was told and then sat on the table to wait. And that was the hardest part of it, the waiting. She knew she was pregnant, had suspected it before they took James away. 

When the doctor came in, Natalia recognized her from the training room. Dr. Petrokov slipped on some gloves and motioned for her to lay back. “How long were you and the soldier lovers before they caught him?”

Natalia swore she would not cry but shameful tears burned her eyes. “Not long,” she lied.

Petrokov grunted and did a manual exam, pressing on Natalia’s uterus with one hand while manipulating it internally. And it hurt. “Were there any other men?” she asked indifferently.

“No.”

“So you know it’s his?”

Natalia got frightened. “Please don’t hurt my baby. Please.”

Maybe there was still a trace of humanity in Petrokov. She smiled at the young woman and said, “I am not going to hurt the baby, but I do need to take some fluid. I need to see how it’s developing.”

Natalia saw the needle and shuddered. The doctor covered her abdomen with alcohol and then found a place to insert the needle. It hurt worse than hell! It was awful! She wanted to scream but didn’t. Drawing out less than two millimeters of fluid, she took it to a set of slides that had been prepared. “You should be fine,” Petrokov assured her and added a drop of precious fluid to each slide. “Go home and rest. If you start bleeding get to a hospital quickly.” And that was it.

 

The aide stood back waiting for the doctor to speak. Finally he asked, “It is his?”

Petrokov wiped her brow and set the cigarette in the overflowing tray. “It is his.”

“Will you let her keep it?”

“For the time being. I noticed some irregularities in the fluid that it may have inherited from him. Or her, who knows?” Rubbing her brow again, she said, “We’ll take it before term. IF we can keep it alive perhaps we’ll have our first hereditary super soldier.”

“Keep breeding them?”

“No. Not yet anyway. There are easier ways to do that. I’m going home now. Call me if I’m needed.”

 

Natasha stood in the street like any other citizen and watched the fire gut the building that had once housed the children’s ward. She’s made sure the children had been evacuated before burning it to the ground. Hatred burned in her heart and festered in her brain. Her own baby, taken from her three years earlier, had not survived what they had done to him, but she had her revenge. All those involved in taking her baby, her son, were dead by her own hands. Her one regret? She had lost James in the shuffle. They had moved him, and she had no idea where. Letting the rage settle like a cold serpent in her breast, she turned and walked away.


	8. Natasha's Grief

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How do you tell the man you love that you once had a child together?

A typical early spring day in Volgograd was cold and damp, but Natasha had somewhere she needed to be before James got up, and so with reluctance she pulled herself away from his warm sleeping body. The hotel room was extremely modern for the ancient city once known as Stalingrad, but even so it was still chilly. Reaching for her robe, she headed towards the bathroom. 

She’d debated telling him for weeks while they made plans to return to Russia. He had a right to know she told herself, but in the end she decided against it. He had been on ice while all of this was happening. Why hurt him for what he could not have prevented? Why punish him for being unable to save either of them?

Natasha was almost ready to leave when she felt him awaken. Impossible she knew, but she really could feel him. Turning to him with a smile on her face, she thought he looked like sin wrapped in a downy comforter. “I’ll be back in a few hours,” she told him while pulling on her fur lined leather gloves.

“Wait and I’ll go with you,” he offered and pulled the comforter down to give himself a good scratch, and to show Natasha what she was missing no doubt.

She grinned and crawled on the bed to kiss him. “I’m going to be cold when I get back. I need you to stay nice and toasty and warm.” He smiled but she could see the doubt in his eyes.

“Where are you going?” he asked softly when she tried to draw away from him.

She looked into his beautiful eyes and wanted to tell him to not follow her, but a part of her wanted him to do just that. She wanted him to know her dark painful secret without actually having to tell him. “There’s a cemetery not far from here. I won’t be gone long.” Now the choice was his to follow or not. She kissed once more softly on the lips before slipping away.

 

Tulips were breaking through the frosty ground over her baby’s grave, beautiful early blooming red ones. She knew from the slow crunch of boots on gravel behind her that James had followed. She didn’t need to turn her head to know there was a confused look on his face, that he could see the simple name on the small grave marker. Yasha.

“They didn’t give him a name,” she explained without turning around. “Did not want anyone to get too attached to him,” she added and choked down the violent emotion raging in her breast. “I found him too late.” Tears burned her eyes as she remembered that horrible moment. “I burned them all,” she spoke barely above a whisper. “I made them pay for what they did to him…to…us.” He crouched beside her, his eyes asking her what he could not speak. “I didn’t know how to tell you,” she said and touched his cheek. “I didn’t know if it would matter or not… you knowing.”

He folded her into his arms, his own thoughts in turmoil as he digested this new grief. “Did you… move him here?” he asked with a hitch in his throat. 

“I couldn’t leave him there…unmarked…unloved.” Natasha Romanoff did not cry for things that mattered not to her life as it was, but for this. Grief and remorse… and loss. The one good pure thing that had been a part of her life had been ripped away from her.

He held her protectively within the shelter of his great coat, her tears hot upon his shirt. She had named the little boy after him, after his father. He would be strong for her, hold her tightly although the realization as it gelled in his mind was devastating. He would always be there for her, because in the end she had suffered the death of the living, the eternal loss, the not knowing. 

Returning to the hotel room, the gravity of what had happened to her son…to his son…weighed heavier and heavier on him. He wanted to be strong for Natasha…he needed to be strong for her…behind closed doors, the tears burned his eyes. This was not what he wanted, what he needed to be. He needed to be strong for her. 

Natasha looked up at him and stroked his face. “It’s all right, James. It’s all right.”

Together they grieved the loss of their son, holding each other tightly, afraid to let go. He wanted to be strong for her, but in the end his weakness was his strength. Natasha loved him, and he her. They were each a half of a whole, and in the end that whole was stronger than either of them apart.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> James' reaction is based on someone I once loved. We lost a baby and he was strong for me....but in private he said he wept. I think it would have been better if we had wept together. But that is just me.


	9. Love

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> final chapter....based on possible movie ideas...Bucky and Nat meet again

Her, twice.  
Emotions! Emotions flooded his body and threatened to overwhelm him. It was  
Natalia! Schooling his face, he tried to look only mildly interested in the woman entering the safe house he momentarily shared with Steve, Sam and Clint.

“Natasha,” Steve began enthusiastically, “I want you to meet my friend Bucky.”

How does one pretend to not know the woman who once meant the world to you? How does one pretend to not remember that you also shot her… twice? 

“Natalia,” he misspoke.

“Natasha,” she corrected.

“My apologies. Natasha,” he corrected himself. Finding the most terrible emotions swelling in his breast, he choked out, “I am so sorry I did what I did to you. I…” He stopped. Sam and Steve were staring at him with tormented expressions on their faces. “I remember shooting you, and I cannot make amends for that,” Bucky said.

Natasha, her face showing that she was working through her own emotions, nodded quickly and said, “You were not yourself. No apologies necessary.” She would not or could not look at him.

He stepped back, trying to put on a brave face. “Thank you, but I will never forget what I did to you.”

She looked at him now, seeing the pain on his face and in his eyes. For a second he saw hers and then she retreated behind the mask of indifference. “Do not dwell on it,” she said politely. “Now, I need to speak with Steve.”

“Yes, of course,” he said and excused himself, unable to stay in the same room with her with such a wall between them. This time he was certain he would not be able to climb it. No sneaking into her heart the way he had once snuck into her room. Retiring to his room, he threw himself on his bunk and covered his eyes with his right forearm and tried to make no noise as his heart broke. He’d shot the woman he had once loved, still loved.   
No returning from that.

Steve knocked on the bedroom door after she left to see about him. “Buck, you OK?”

“Oh fuckin’ yeah,” Bucky replied sarcastically and sat up. 

Steve entered the room. “Natasha knows you weren’t yourself. For her it’s over.”

Bucky couldn’t help himself. Holding his hands to his head, he screamed his rage and pain. It was over. Over! What woman would love a man who had shot her? Getting to his feet, he turned away from Steve and the two men now peering into his room through the open door.

“Buck, it will be all right. You’ll see,” Steve said and ventured closer.

“No!” he screamed and put his fist through the wall. Sam and Clint now entered the room, prepared to help Steve if Bucky turned all that anger and pain on him. Hugging himself, head hanging, Bucky sobbed, “It’s never going to be all right!”

Sam sensed there was something more at play here than a man’s regret for shooting a woman, although that was terrible in itself. “Buck, what are we missing?” 

Bucky snapped his head around, his face streaked with tears. “Don’t.”

Clint figured it out. “You know her!” he exclaimed. “That explains the funny looks she gave me.”

Steve felt utterly stupid. “Buck, you should have said something.”

“What? What should I have said, Steve? That the woman I once lived for now hates me with a passion.”

“No she doesn’t,” Clint spoke up. “She may be afraid of you….” Bucky turned away and screamed again, his arms wrapped tighter around his body. “Wrong thing to say?” he asked Sam.  
“Yeah, I’m pretty sure he didn’t to know that.”

“Can you people just leave me alone?” Bucky growled with his back to them.

Steve nodded towards the door but did not leave the room until he had the Glock out of the bedside table. “Until you calm down,” he said firmly, “I’m keeping this.” Bucky made a half-hearted attempt to get the weapon from Steve, but Capt. America moved just a little quicker. “When you calm down.”

Sam, his mind working well ahead of the others, said, “I’m going out for a little while. Clint, want to come with me?”

“Pizza?”

“Yeah, we’ll get some on our way back.”

Steve gave Sam a piercing look but did not ask any questions. Sitting on the sofa, he turned on the TV. Sam and Clint slipped out the door and hurried down the stairs to the blue car parked in the street. “Where are we going?” Clint asked, although he suspected he already knew. 

“If he’s a mess our other friend might be one too.”

Driving through the dark rainy streets, Sam listened as Clint tried to get Natasha on the phone. After the third attempt, she answered, “I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Yeah, well your former boyfriend has put his fist through the wall and Steve has taken his piece from him. Thought you might want to help us with him,” Sam spoke up. 

“Meet me at the diner on the corner of Howard.”

She was waiting for them in a rear booth when they arrived. Coffee was poured and waiting. Clint slid in beside Natasha while Sam sat across from her. A waitress came over and asked if they wanted anything to eat. Clint ordered a cheese burger which also sounded good to Sam. “Extra fries,” he added. Turning to Natasha who was staring into her cup, he asked, “How are you doing?” 

“I knew Steve had found him,” she answered wearily, “but until I saw him, it wasn’t real.”

“He’s real enough,” Clint said, “and tearing the apartment apart.” 

Natasha fixed her brilliant tear glazed eyes on Sam. “The last time I saw him as something other than a killer was sixty years ago.” She waited for that information to sink in. “We were both hardly more than children.” She paused for a smile. “He would sneak away to see me.” The smile faded into horror. “One night they followed him. He fought until I was threatened then he gave up and let them take him. The next day they made me see what they had done to him.” Tears and a new horror joined the memory. “He was in deep freeze, not alive but not dead either. My fault.”

“Not hardly,” Clint snorted. “You were kids up against some rough players.”

“It doesn’t change anything,” she said and took a sip of coffee. “Today was the first time I’ve really spoken to him in all this time.”

“You can’t call that speaking to him,” Sam said, “not when there is an audience eaves dropping.”

Natasha tried to smile but couldn’t. “I’m afraid.”

“Can’t believe that,” Clint contradicted her. “The woman I know would stare Ultron in the face and spit on him.”

“Really Ultron?” Sam growled at Clint.

“What would you say?”

“I would say you need to talk to him. Just the two of you.”

“Not many places for that kind of privacy,” she said solemnly.

“Well I know one,” Sam said and pulled out his phone. Hitting speed dial, he said, “Steve, get your jacket. We’re going out for pizza.”

“What about our burgers?” Clint asked.

“Bag’em up and bring them with us,” Sam said, “Bet Bucky hasn’t had a greasy burger since World War Two.” Returning to his conversation with Steve who was humming in his ear, he said, “I’m bringing Natasha back to talk to Bucky. They really need to talk and there’s no time like the present. What do you mean I’m a walking cliché? Tell the wrecking crew to get cleaned up, he’s got a visitor coming.”

Bucky and Steve were sitting on the couch watching a hockey game when Sam burst through the door ahead of Clint and Natasha. “Got your jacket on Capt. Rogers?”

“Yeah.”

“Good, these are for you,” Sam said and passed the burgers to Bucky whose eyes were fixed entirely on Natasha. “Come, come, we gotta go before Clint eats the upholstery in the back seat. Better check the fries, he may have eaten some.”

“I haven’t eaten since noon,” Clint protested and followed Sam and Steve out of the apartment.

Now they were alone staring at each other. “I’m glad you came back,” he finally said and tried to smile.

“Clint said you were tearing up the apartment,” she answered with her own hesitant smile. “Sam was worried about the deposit.”

“Yeah, I need to patch that hole before we leave,” he admitted and set the burgers on the coffee table. When he looked up there were fresh tears in his eyes. “I’ve missed you so much.”

“Not as much as I’ve missed you,” she countered. He was suddenly taking her into his arms, his lips devouring hers, the full solid length of him pressed against hers. She felt so small against him. Pain and pleasure battled for control of her thoughts and memories, and for a moment she thought she was going to be overwhelmed by them. He was aroused and starving for affection, and she thought maybe they were moving too fast, but his needs were more overwhelming than her fears.

He took her back to his room, and with clothes strewn across the floor, they found the beauty of life in each other’s arms. Slowly but surely the Winter Soldier melted in her hands and beneath her kisses. There was no hurry now save for how they wanted to make love. Desperate to make him feel loved, she kissed his face, eyes and lips while moving slowly on top of him. So much strength and beauty with such a fragile and tender heart. She brought him twice before permitting herself the same pleasure. There was no talking tonight, no long deep soul searching conversation. He fell asleep in her arms, and she could not bring herself to leave him.

 

“Well she was supposed to call when she was through talking,” Sam explained as he unlocked the door to the apartment.

“I don’t think they did much talking,” Clint said as he looked at the blouse on the sofa.

Steve grinned at the tie hanging on the door knob to Bucky’s room. “No, I don’t guess they did.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love these two characters.


End file.
